Police let market town brothel stay open for 10 years, councillors say

Councillors in a market town are demanding to know why a brothel was allowed to continue for ten years after police were first tipped off.

Officers finally raided the "massage parlour" in Trowbridge, Wilts, as part of an operation led by the National Crime Agency into human trafficking.

They found a punter with two middle-age English women who told him they were happy working at the sex den. The madame was traced as mother-of-two Marion Meyer-Smith, 49, who admitted running the brothel in the flat for 14 years.

Police should have shut it down, there's no doubt about itCllr Pete Fuller

She raked in between £100 - £150 a week from the two sex workers, both of whom were working in their hometown. Meyer-Smith, who lives in Chepstow, Gwent, was spared jail earlier this month with a 12-month term suspended for two years at Swindon Crown Court.

But the court heard that police had been tipped off about the brothel in Norwood Court by a local a decade earlier but failed to act until last June.

A letting agent contacted the police to tell them what was going on there and got an acknowledgement from the force.

Local councillor John Knight said: "It's absolutely shocking and inexcusable that the brothel was allowed to remain open and the police have a lot to answer for.

"I had no idea that kind of thing was going on there but if the police did they should have shut it down immediately.

"Prostitution really is a big problem and you have to wonder why Wiltshire Police aren't giving it a higher profile."

Cllr Pete Fuller added: "Police should have shut it down, there's no doubt about it. They should not choose which laws they uphold and which ones they don't or it would cause anarchy and leave them open to accusations.

"Some European countries are more liberal than us and don't seem to mind brothels but I for one hope they are never legalised in the UK."